In January 2024, the retail sector experienced a solid start, nearly matching the high levels of activity seen in December’s holiday season and marking a significant increase from the previous year. This positive trend was highlighted in the latest CNBC/NRF Retail Monitor report. Retail sales, excluding automobiles and gasoline, experienced a slight decrease of 0.16% month-over-month but saw a rise of 2.34% year-over-year. This performance underscores consumers’ continued optimism and spending willingness, buoyed by the growth in employment and wages.
Core retail sales, which exclude restaurants, autos, and gas, showed a minimal month-over-month decline of 0.04% but an encouraging annual increase of 3.24%. This data, derived from actual credit and debit card transactions, provides a real-time snapshot of consumer behavior without requiring revisions often associated with survey-based data.
The report also elaborated on performance across a range of retail categories, with six out of nine categories witnessing annual growth. Online sales, health and personal care stores, and clothing and accessory stores led the gains. On a monthly basis, five categories showed improvement. Specific highlights include a significant 25.47% year-over-year increase in online sales, a 9.7% rise in health and personal care stores, and a 5.9% growth in clothing and accessories stores.
